Thursday, 18 July 2013

At the iste conference Steven Johnston's keynote recommend that we should be influenced by lots of different sources, I thought I would take his advice when writing a post about encouraging students to have the confidence to follow their dreams.

A) I draw on these examples on this post in support of Adam
Bellow's invitation for educators to change the world...

I saw Monster University earlier in the week with my kids, which has a great message for kids to follow their dreams, regardless of the obstacles they might face... it also highlighted that university is not the only route to fulfilling your dreams. But then again there seems to be little that can match the powerful combination of a vision and the right work ethic.

But dreams can be fragile things and need to be handled with care. A kind word of encouragement can breath life into the dream; equally some careless criticism can crush it. Monster University opens with Mike on a field trip to Monster Inc, during the field trip he accidentally walks past a safety line and is pulled back by a monster named Frank McCoy, who went to Monsters University. Because of this encounter Mike's life long dream is to work at Monsters Inc as a scarer to generate electricity for the monster world.

Electrifying the Dream

Henry Ford worked at the Edison Company and his line manager offered him a promotion on the condition that he would give up "wasting his time" on his gas engine.

After making his decision to focus on his car, Ford caught up with Thomas Edison at a conference. Ford told him
what he was working on and asked if Edison thought there
was a future for the internal combustion engine. He answered:

"Yes, there's a big future for any light engine that can develop a high horse power and be self-contained. No one
kind of motive power is ever going to do all the work of the country. We do not
know what electricity can do, but I take for granted that it cannot do
everything. Keep on with your engine if you can get what you areafter, I can see a great future.”Henry Ford Autobiography - My Life & My Work

This encounter and these kind words were the start of a life-long friendship. I wonder what might have happened if Edison had echo'd Ford's manager's view and told Ford that he was wasting his time

Common Cents

Adam Bellows' inspiring #iste13 closing keynote told the
audience to make a difference... He showed how easy this can be using something
as simple as common sense... Or was it "the common 1 cent"?

A kind word wouldn't even cost 1 cent, but giving your tuppence worth when commenting on a students aspirations could literally take the seed of an idea and plant an acre of diamonds.

When people think of change in education the temptation may be
to think of grand plans and sweeping reforms. Bellow told us to imagine
differently.

Did these people lack confidence to explore their world when they were toddlers? They had enough confidence and curiosity to learn to walk and talk so can only assume that they were, so

At what point does their confidence diminish? What were the "mysterious forces" that adversely affected their confidence?

Adam Bellow advocates turning some small change into a big idea. An important area that I think can make a big
difference is to instill a sense of confidence that some students may not get at home, whether intentional or unintentional. In a chat on youth employment this subject came up;

You May Say I'm a Dreamer...This got me thinking do we not know what we want to
do when we are young? Or do we know but the bar get inadvertently lowered for us?

"Everyone, when they are young, knows what their destiny is. At that point in their lives, everything is clear and everything is possible. They are not afraid to dream, and to yearn for everything they would like to happen in their lives. But, as time passes, a mysterious force begins to convince them that it will be impossible for them to realise their destiny"

Do we know what we want to do as children, but we are
discouraged as our aspirations are too wistful? The Alchemist is a novel which some may see as too flighty to include as part of any basis for education and/or career advice, but maybe The Alchemist that is right. What would happen if the job title of teacher/educator was changed to that of "Dream-maker," would this change the way educators taught?

Up until a certain age when the "mysterious force" takes hold, are kids inclined to think about their dreams more than any school work?

In "Just Do it" the story of Nike Andre Agassis tells how he went out to parks and he would see
the kids pretending they were him. Agassi recalls “They’d be ripping balls
into the far fence, pounding the balls over the fence. And I’d think, ‘what
have we [him and the Nike ads] done?’

Following this year's Wimbledon final I wonder how many "young Andy Murray's" have changed their back yard to Wimbledon's Centre Court with their young, vivid imaginations Ayn Rand points out that she decided to be a writer at 9 years old and everything that she did was integrated to that purpose.

Parents as Con-Artists - The Confidence Trick

As a parent I see confidence as an important
attribute that we can instill in our kids...

To have the confidence to try new things To have the
confidence to fail To have the confidence to try again To have the confidence
to fall down...and to get up again To have the confidence to dream

When we read about findings like the UCU survey, it is unfortunate to hear that confidence is not instilled in every child at home, but we know that inequalities exist and that this is another area where educators can make a difference.

Pixar BoyI know of a boy who, at the age of 8 years old, said "Dad I want to work at Pixar when I'm older" Now this dad would regularly tell his kids that they can do anything they set their
mind to and faviourite bedtime reading included "The Little Engine that Could" and "OH The Places You Go" so there were no comments like "Well my boy, you know most of Pixar's
staff are in California and are fantastic at drawing... You are in the UK and I've
seen some of your art work on the wall at school, maybe we should lower your expectations a little?"

This Dad said "Sure you can!" And then found ways to bring California and Pixar a little closer to him... finding story's from John Lassater's childhood that were similar to this young lads' experiences, enrolling him in art and drama classes, giving him "Pixar Boy" as one of his nicknames... anything that might help bring this dream to life in his young impressionable mind.You would be forgiven if you were to think that this kid's name was Michael Giacchino's who got an Oscar in 2010 for the best music score for Up (I love Giacchino's acceptance speech... every educator should watch this - Michael Giacchino's Oscar acceptance speech)No this particular 8 year old is only 10 years old today and happens to be one of my kids.

The chances of him actually working at Pixar? 900 members
of staff Vs 7 Billion people = pretty big odds so may, in reality, be unlikely...

Chances of working at Pixar?Unknown Permission to chase
your dreams?Absolutely 100%!

He may well find that, like the intrepid young Mike Wazowski, he faces some insurmountable obstacles... but if all else fails then he knows he can follow Mike's lead and that, with a little vision and determination, there is always a way to keep a dream alive.

I'd give up my Kingdom to work at Pixar's Mailroom

So far, through following his young dream, he's already had the chance to be the king of Scotland and work in Scotland's biggest panto among other things. By being involved in these shows we are hoping to instil a warped sense of the world of grown ups and work... as people in the arts seem to have a great time when they go to work.This is a warped sense of work that we sincerely hope stays with him for the rest of his life;

Turning the Workhouse into a Funhouse

Our little Pixar Boy recently coined a fantastic phrase in our house. I came home from work one day and was met by a very
excited young lad

"Dad, Dad... I've just watched a behind the scenes
program of Pixar and they have this and this and that..."Then he stopped
and looked at me with an animated look on his face and said;

"You know Dad, they don't go to work everyday... THEY GO TO FUN"

I replied excitedly "Boys that's it! When you grow up don't go to work... Make sure you go to FUN"

"Pixar Boys" future colleagues working hard... at Fun?!

Rand is an advocate of epistemology (the study of knowledge and justified belief) and of all the biographies and success stories I have read, there seems to be one key commonality with people, who appear to have balanced, fulfilled lives and who excel in
their chosen profession;

"They do what they love; and love what they do"

They are so passionate about what they do that it hardly appears to be work at all. So giving people the permission and confidence to go dream chasing sure does seem like a good idea to me. To cite one example consider Edward Cureton's findings during his time as a military psychologist who helped train US pilots during World War II. Cureton designed a questionnaire to find out which recruits had "The Right Stuff" to be a pilot. One particular question predicted the success of pilots than the rest;Did you ever build a model airplane that flew?"The pilots who answered yes were more likely to succeed as pilots... the passion for planes, of people who had been doing it since they were young ended up being predictive - They would stick with the training no matter how many times they were sick in the plane during training.

As educators take a well earned break and reflect on another busy year, it may be a good time to remind yourself that anyone who is "living their dream" today will almost certainly be doing so because an educator brought the subject area they work in today to life - they will have inspired the young impressionable mind and given the student the confidence to chase the dream... until their body and mind was able to catch up with their run away imagination and are now living it.I wonder how many educators teach today because someone brought learning to life for them.

Regardless of the subject you teach, or the students' exam results or the obstacles in the way... remember to tell your kids "Sure you can!" Because the University and College Union survey and Edgar Guest warns us of the danger of that most insidious word - Can't... make sure we protect our kids from it by teaching them to Answer this demon with "I CAN!"

Kid friendly summary of this postDear Teacher, In the new school year I hope that you are not like Matilda's Head Teacher Miss Trunchbull or the Grand High Witch.

If I had magic powers like Matilda I would wish that you were like Miss Honey or like the BFG... someone who knows the importance of dreams and who can bottle up
the whizz popping ones and keep them safe so they don't float away from me... or get forgotten... or, worst of all, smashed against the rocks of those two careless words - "'You Can't!' ...when with just a little encouragement and imagination 'I think I can, I think I can, I think I can'"

Friday, 5 July 2013

In the 3 years that I have been on Twitter I have never
seen anything as manic as last weeks #iste13 - The hashtag for the International Society for Technology in Education annual conference.

20,000 connected technology loving educators talked (and talked!) about technology in education... for 3 days solid! This produced over 40,000 Tweets.

Twitter seemed to be such a key part of the conference, so much so that it created an "unconference" hashtag#notatiste. The crazy thing was that even this was a trending for a lot of the event! Only educators could have an "I'm not at the
conference" hashtag trend?!

While there was a lot of envy from those not at the conference, the Twitterati did a great job at keeping everyone informed of the goings ons... and some even found ways to make their own fun - Tips for surviving Iste if you're not there... Love the latte prank!

Another aspect of the conference seemed to be that each slide of Adam Bellow's closing keynote presentation "You are invited to change the world" seemed to be
Twitter friendly. This is something that I am noticing more often. I don't know if this was intentional but Scott Stratten from Unmarketing does actually structure his presentations to fit into 140 Tweetable characters.

I would say that I am taking a cue from these presenters and making this one of my shortest posts ever... But the truth is, once you know
the reason for the post, you will skip any text and go straight to the data... but before you do I have a suggestion.The #iste Twitter challenge - "Unconnected" EducatorsSend this post or the files below to any colleagues who are not on Twitter or any other Social Media channels and ask them to spend 5 minutes looking at the Tweets and challenge them NOT to learn something new and interesting.

While connected educators and Twitter are both great... Putting the 2 together in large numbers is a nightmare! The Tweets were just coming too quick and fast!

Connected Educators - Straw Poll

Now for a quick straw poll for all the connected educators who made all this noise and generated all this #iste13 content... Hands up if;

Your Twitter account is now bulging with Tweets
and links that are marked as faviourites for you to check out? How many of these faviourites have you checked since the event?

You felt that the Twitter stream was too frantic!While you saw lots of great suggestions and resources.... you know that you missed lots of great tips, links and discussions?

I found myself giving the wrong answer to these questions
so I thought I would download all the conference Tweets in a way that would allow me to look for key words quickly, as well as to organise any data or discussions that would allow me to identify some trends.

For people in the UK who follow my blog I have done the same for the recent #Educationfest Conference:Educationfest Tweets

I will be adding this to the data I have gathered from other #edchat sessions as I continue the search for some "slow hunch" eureka edu ideas... More details on this to follow In the mean time I hope you find this data set useful and that it helps to ensure that you don't miss any of the great EdTech resources that were discussed.If this is the first time visiting my blog please feel free to check out some of the other posts or some of my other reports, which can be found here.Iste delegates and followers may be particularly interested in Tech Story - What Education can Learn from Pixars Toy Story.